Holiday club was a bad break

A COUPLE realised almost immediately after paying £2,000 for a holiday club discount scheme that it was a costly mistake, and years later new debt demands linked to the same contract have caused them sleepless nights.

There has been no peace for Pat and Pete Rowe after recently getting bullying letters from Gibraltar-based Leisure Alliance Plc accusing them of owing a further £900.

The scare tactics include threatening to send in debt collectors if the Rowes refuse to settle, a situation that Leisure Alliance’s Maxwell Hamilton warns “will considerably worsen your current predicament”.

Pete and Pat’s original subscription was for a discounted holidays and flights agreement called Concierge Platinum Indefinite Membership run by Club Class, which is now within the Leisure Alliance Plc fold.

Seven connected Club Class companies were wound up by the Insolvency Service in the High Court two years ago on the grounds they mis-sold membership of a concierge holiday plan.

“We gave in to a hard sell during a holiday in Tenerife in 2009, they even walked us back to our hotel to get our credit card. We said the next day we wanted to pull out but they would not let us,” recalled Pete.

“Previously we had bought timeshare weeks and always been very satisfied but whenever we tried to book a holiday with this scheme they did not get back to us. We had no benefit and in the end thought we would just write the whole thing off to experience.

We gave in to a hard sell during a holiday in Tenerife in 2009, they even walked us back to our hotel to get our credit card. We said the next day we wanted to pull out but they would not let us

Pete Rowe

"We wrote saying we were cancelling our membership and did not hear anything for years until we got a call in 2012 asking for another annual fee. We refused and in 2013 the same thing happened,” he added.

The letters they received this year were of a different order. “The thought of a debt collector turning up is really distressing.

There is a temptation to pay even though they have done nothing to justify taking our money,” Pete said.

Crusader wrote to Leisure Alliance demanding to know the exact contract term that made the Rowes liable for £900 of charges: a figure made up apparently of annual subscription arrears, a membership termination charge and “additional handling charges”.

We also pointed out to Pete and Pat the feasibility of any action given the potential cost to an overseas company of appointing a UK collection agency which would also need evidence that the debt was legally owed.

Anyone receiving demands should sit tight, as www.mindtimeshare.com suggests. This Spain-based group advises and represents European timeshare owners, some of whom have fallen victim to fraud.

Its enforcement director Alberto Garcia said: “Most of these memberships do not mention an obligation to pay fees, only that in the case of failure the membership will be de-activated.”

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Tighter regulations, including cooling off periods enabling consumers to cancel timeshare contracts, were introduced in February 2011.

In response to Crusader’s inquiry Leisure Alliance said Club Class was a “floating entity” and “unaffected” by the UK High Court action. It said the Rowes had used the service but it had discovered an “oversight” and no cancellation clause had been included. This reduced the couple’s liability to £190.

“We’re glad we asked for Crusader’s help,” said Pete. “We’ll be ripping up any new demands.”

PEDAL POWER

Maureen and Tony Weston have written to single but mobility equipment maker Van Os Medical UK.

The couple, from Shewsbury, bought one of its lightweight aluminium wheelchairs last year but recently spotted someone with the same model which also sported some rubber cushioning pedals that made tilting it easier.

“We called Van Os and the following day received our pedals free of charge.